THE GRAY MAN

by Sarah Orne Jewett

High on the southern slope of Agamenticus there may still be seen the
remnant of an old farm. Frost-shaken stone walls surround a
fast-narrowing expanse of smooth turf which the forest is overgrowing
on every side. The cellar is nearly filled up, never having been either
wide or deep, and the fruit of a few mossy apple-trees drops ungathered
to the ground. Along one side of the forsaken garden is a thicket of
seedling cherry-trees to which the shouting robins come year after year
in busy flights; the caterpillars' nests are unassailed and populous in
this untended hedge. At night, perhaps, when summer twilights are late
in drawing their brown curtain of dusk over the great rural scene, - at
night an owl may sit in the hemlocks near by and hoot and shriek until
the far echoes answer back again. As for the few men and women who pass
this deserted spot, most will be repulsed by such loneliness, will even
grow impatient with those mistaken fellow-beings who choose to live in
solitude, away from neighbors and from schools, - yes, even from gossip
and petty care of self or knowledge of the trivial fashions of a narrow
life.

Now and then one looks out from this eyrie, across the wide-spread
country, who turns to look at the sea or toward the shining foreheads
of the mountains that guard the inland horizon, who will remember the
place long afterward. A peaceful vision will come, full of rest and
benediction into busy and troubled hours, to those who understand why
some one came to live in this place so near the sky, so silent, so full
of sweet air and woodland fragrance; so beaten and buffeted by winter
storms and garlanded with summer greenery; where the birds are nearest
neighbors and a clear spring the only wine-cellar, and trees of the
forest a choir of singers who rejoice and sing aloud by day and night
as the winds sweep over. Under the cherry thicket or at the edge of the
woods you may find a strayaway blossom, some half-savage, slender
grandchild of the old flower-plots, that you gather gladly to take
away, and every year in June a red rose blooms toward which the wild
pink roses and the pale sweet briars turn wondering faces as if a queen
had shown her noble face suddenly at a peasant's festival.

There is everywhere a token of remembrance, of silence and secrecy.
Some stronger nature once ruled these neglected trees and this fallow
ground. They will wait the return of their master as long as roots can
creep through mould, and the mould make way for them. The stories of
strange lives have been whispered to the earth, their thoughts have
burned themselves into the cold rocks. As one looks from the lower
country toward the long slope of the great hillside, this old
abiding-place marks the dark covering of trees like a scar. There is
nothing to hide either the sunrise or the sunset. The low lands reach
out of sight into the west and the sea fills all the east.

The first owner of the farm was a seafaring man who had through
freak or fancy come ashore and cast himself upon the bounty of nature
for support in his later years, though tradition keeps a suspicion of
buried treasure and of a dark history. He cleared his land and built
his house, but save the fact that he was a Scotsman no one knew to whom
he belonged, and when he died the state inherited the unclaimed
property. The only piece of woodland that was worth anything was sold
and added to another farm, and the dwelling-place was left to the
sunshine and the rain, to the birds that built their nests in the
chimney or under the eaves. Sometimes a strolling company of country
boys would find themselves near the house on a holiday afternoon, but
the more dilapidated the small structure became, the more they believed
that some uncanny existence possessed the lonely place, and the path
that led toward the clearing at last became almost impassable.

Once a number of officers and men in the employ of the Coast Survey
were encamped at the top of the mountain, and they smoothed the rough
track that led down to the spring that bubbled from under a sheltering
edge. One day a laughing fellow, not content with peering in at the
small windows of the house, put his shoulder against the rain-blackened
door and broke the simple fastening. He hardly knew that he was afraid
as he first stood within the single spacious room, so complete a
curiosity took possession of him. The place was clean and bare, the
empty cupboard doors stood open, and yet the sound of his companions'
voices outside seemed far away, and an awful sense that some unseen
inhabitant followed his footsteps made him hurry out again pale and
breathless to the fresh air and sunshine. Was this really a
dwelling-place of spirits, as had been already hinted? The story grew
more fearful, and spread quickly like a mist of terror among the
lowland farms. For years the tale of the coast-surveyor's adventure in
the haunted house was slowly magnified and told to strangers or to
wide-eyed children by the dim firelight. The former owner was supposed
to linger still about his old home, and was held accountable for deep
offense in choosing for the scene of his unsuccessful husbandry a place
that escaped the properties and restraints of life upon lower levels.
His grave was concealed by the new growth of oaks and beeches, and many
a lad and full-grown man beside has taken to his heels at the flicker
of light from across a swamp or under a decaying tree in that
neighborhood. As the world in some respects grew wiser, the good people
near the mountain understood less and less the causes of these simple
effects, and as they became familiar with the visible world, grew more
shy of the unseen and more sensitive to unexplained foreboding.

One day a stranger was noticed in the town, as a stranger is sure
to be who goes his way with quick, furtive steps straight through a
small village or along a country road. This man was tall and had just
passed middle age. He was well made and vigorous, but there was an
unusual pallor in his face, a grayish look, as if he had been startled
by bad news. His clothes were somewhat peculiar, as if they had been
made in another country, yet they suited the chilly weather, being
homespun of undyed wools, just the color of his hair, and only a little
darker than his face or hands. Some one observed in one brief glance as
he and this gray man met and passed each other, that his eyes had a
strange faded look; they might, however, flash and be coal-black in a
moment of rage. Two or three persons stepped forward to watch the
wayfarer as he went along the road with long, even strides, like one
taking a journey on foot, but he quickly reached a turn of the way and
was out of sight. They wondered who he was; one recalled some recent
advertisement of an escaped criminal, and another the appearance of a
native of the town who was supposed to be long ago lost at sea, but one
surmiser knew as little as the next. If they had followed fast enough
they might have tracked the mysterious man straight across the country,
threading the by-ways, the shorter paths that led across the fields
where the road was roundabout and hindering. At last he disappeared in
the leafless, trackless woods that skirted the mountain.

That night there was for the first time in many years a twinkling
light in the window of the haunted house, high on the hill's great
shoulder; one farmer's wife and another looked up curiously, while they
wondered what daring human being had chosen that awesome spot of all
others for his home or for even a transient shelter. The sky was
already heavy with snow; he might be a fugitive from justice, and the
startled people looked to the fastening of their doors unwontedly that
night, and waked often from a troubled sleep.

An instinctive curiosity and alarm possessed the country men and
women for a while, but soon faded out and disappeared. The newcomer was
by no means a hermit; he tried to be friendly, and inclined toward a
certain kindliness and familiarity. He bought a comfortable store of
winter provisions from his new acquaintances, giving every one his
price, and spoke more at length, as time went on, of current events, of
politics and the weather, and the town's own news and concerns. There
was a sober cheerfulness about the man, as if he had known trouble and
perplexity, and was fulfilling some mission that gave him pain; yet he
saw some gain and reward beyond; therefore he could be contented with
his life and such strange surroundings. He was more and more eager to
form brotherly relations with the farmers near his home. There was
almost a pleading look in his kind face at times, as if he feared the
later prejudice of his associates. Surely this was no common or
uneducated person, for in every way he left the stamp of his character
and influence upon men and things. His reasonable words of advice and
warning are current as sterling coins in that region yet; to one man he
taught a new rotation of crops, to another he gave some priceless cures
for devastating diseases of cattle. The lonely women of those remote
country homes learned of him how to achieve their household toil with
less labor and drudgery, and here and there he singled out promising
children and kept watch of their growth, giving freely a most
affectionate companionship, and a fair start in the journey of life. He
taught those who were guardians of such children to recognize and
further the true directions and purposes of existence; and the easily
warped natures grew strong and well-established under his thoughtful
care. No wonder that some people were filled with amazement, and
thought his wisdom supernatural, from so many proofs that his horizon
was wider than their own.

Perhaps some envious soul, or one aggrieved by being caught in
treachery or deception, was the first to find fault with the stranger.
The prejudice against his dwelling-place, and the superstition which
had become linked to him in consequence, may have led back to the first
suspicious attitude of the community. The whisper of distrust soon
started on an evil way. If he were not a criminal, his past was surely
a hidden one, and shocking to his remembrance, but the true foundation
of all dislike was the fact that the gray man who went to and fro,
living his simple, harmless life among them, never was seen to smile.
Persons who remember him speak of this with a shudder, for nothing is
more evident than that his peculiarity became at length intolerable to
those whose minds lent themselves readily to suspicion. At first,
blinded by the gentle good fellowship of the stranger, the changeless
expression of his face was scarcely observed, but as the winter wore
away he was watched with renewed disbelief and dismay.

After the first few attempts at gayety nobody tried to tell a merry
story in his presence. The most conspicuous of a joker's audience does
a deep-rankling injustice if he sits with unconscious, unamused face at
the receipt of raillery. What a chilling moment when the gray man
softly opened the door of a farmhouse kitchen, and seated himself like
a skeleton at the feast of walnuts and roasted apples beside the
glowing fire! The children whom he treated so lovingly, to whom he ever
gave his best, though they were won at first by his gentleness, when
they began to prattle and play with him would raise their innocent eyes
to his face and hush their voices and creep away out of his sight. Once
only he was bidden to a wedding, but never afterward, for a gloom was
quickly spread through the boisterous company; the man who never smiled
had no place at such a festival. The wedding guests looked over their
shoulders again and again in strange foreboding, while he was in the
house, and were burdened with a sense of coming woe for the
newly-married pair. As one caught sight of his, among the faces of the
rural folk, the gray man was like a sombre mask, and at last the
bridegroom flung open the door with a meaning gesture, and the stranger
went out like a hunted creature, into the bitter coldness and silence
of the winter night.

Through the long days of the next summer the outcast of the
wedding, forbidden, at length, all the once-proffered hospitality, was
hardly seen from one week's end to another's. He cultivated his poor
estate with patient care, and the successive crops of his small garden,
the fruits and berries of the wilderness, were food enough. He seemed
unchangeable, and was always ready when he even guessed at a chance to
be of use. If he were repulsed, he only turned away and went back to
his solitary home. Those persons who by chance visited him there tell
wonderful tales of the wild birds which had been tamed to come at his
call and cluster about him, of the orderliness and delicacy of his
simple life. The once-neglected house was covered with vines that he
had brought from the woods, and planted about the splintering, decaying
walls. There were three or four books in worn bindings on a shelf above
the fire-place; one longs to know what volumes this mysterious exile
had chosen to keep him company!

There may have been a deeper reason for the withdrawal of
friendliness; there are vague rumors of the gray man's possession of
strange powers. Some say that he was gifted with amazing strength, and
once when some belated hunters found shelter at his fireside, they told
eager listeners afterward that he did not sleep but sat by the fire
reading gravely while they slumbered uneasily on his own bed of boughs.
And in the dead of night an empty chair glided silently toward him
across the floor as he softly turned his pages in the flickering light.

But such stories are too vague, and in that neighborhood too common
to weigh against the true dignity and bravery of the man. At the
beginning of the war of the rebellion he seemed strangely troubled and
disturbed, and presently disappeared, leaving his house key with a
neighbor as if for a few days' absence. He was last seen striding
rapidly through the village a few miles away, going back along the road
by which he had come a year or two before. No, not last seen either;
for in one of the first battles of the war, as the smoke suddenly
lifted, a farmer's boy, reared in the shadow of the mountain, opened
his languid pain-dulled eyes as he lay among the wounded, and saw the
gray man riding by on a tall horse. At that moment the poor lad thought
in his faintness and fear that Death himself rode by in the gray man's
likeness; unsmiling Death who tries to teach and serve mankind so that
he may at the last win welcome as a faithful friend!